OCZ 'Core Series' HALVES SSD Prices

OCZ already stole our hearts with its pricey but barnstorming 64GB SATA II, so what if that pesky price problem was about to disappear...?

In possibly the biggest news to hit the SSD arena since Samsung shocked us in May (the two are known to work closely) is OCZ's 'Core Series' a line which it claims more than halves costs without sacrificing performance.

Available in 32GB ('OCZ OCZSSD2-1C32G'), 64GB ('OCZ OCZSSD2-1C64G') and 128GB ('OCZ OCZSSD2-1C128G') capacities, the Cores will come with RRPs of just $169 (£84), $259 (£129) and $479 (£240) respectively. Compare this with OCZ's £700+ asking price for its (undeniably excellent) 64GB SSD just two months ago and you can see why we are excited.
Remarkably, performance isn't taking a nosedive on the range either with OCZ quoting read/write speeds in the range of 100MBps and 80MBps for the 32GB and 64GB models and a rampaging 143MBps and 93MBps for the 128GBer. The all important 0.35ms rated seek time also makes them up to 10x faster than traditional HDDs for everyday activities.

Couple that with a 50 per cent average power and weight saving, far greater durability due to a lack of moving parts, no need to defrag and no heat built up and (to coin a newsworthy pun) this looks like game, set and match.

"SSDs offer higher performance, reliability, and energy efficiency than conventional HDDs but the cost variance has limited adoption of vastly superior SSD technology, until now," said Ryan Petersen, CEO of OCZ Technology. "It is our mission to deliver the highest performance products to consumers at reasonable prices, and with the release of the Core Series SSDs we have done exactly that.

Get them into your laptops and desktops ASAP. Computing life is about to get a whole lot faster.

Update: We've just got UK release and pricing info through. The former is great with all models landing on 7 July (!) but we have taken something of a hit with 'Being British Tax' upping them to: £117.99, £179.99 and £319.99 respectively. I could complain, but there's so much drool on my keyboard I'd feel hypocritical...

Note: Hugo has made a very good point to me: with a WD Velociraptor carrying a £250 RRP the ultra high-end HDD space has to now be under serious threat....